Israel's retaliatory strikes last week in response to Iran's military blitz could have been a lot worse had it executed its original plan for an extensive counterstrike, including bombarding military installations.
According to a report in The New York Times, Israel scaled back its attack to avoid a full-scale war with Iran and due to diplomatic pressure from US and foreign allies.
The report, which quoted three senior Israeli officials, said that Israel originally wanted to bombard military targets across Iran, including capital Tehran.
" ... a broad and damaging attack would have been far harder for Iran to overlook, increasing the chances of a forceful Iranian counterattack that could have brought the Middle East to the brink of a major regional conflict," the report said.
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It said that after intervention from US President Joe Biden and foreign ministers of UK and Germany, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu chose to carry out a limited strike and reduce the chances of an escalation.
Why Israel did not stick to original plan?
As tensions were building before the Iranian strike, Israel was already preparing for an expected retaliation. It could have either conducted a defensive operation to block Iranian attack or mounted a huge offensive operation.
Earlier, Israel believed that Iran would attack them with a “swarm” of large drones and up to 10 ballistic missiles, officials told NYT. But the attack turned out to be much more extensive than expected with Iran firing over 100 ballistic missiles, 170 drones and 30 cruise missiles.
However, Israel managed to defend itself successfully, taking down a majority of these drones and missiles and limiting the damage on the ground. This eliminated the need for a swift and extensive retaliation.
The report said that during an early-morning phone call, Biden urged Netanyahu to treat the successful defence as a "victory" that required no further response.
"Netanyahu emerged from the call opposed to an immediate retaliation," the Israelis told NYT.
The next day, Israel signalled its allies that it will retaliate but in a contained manner.
Foreign officials urged Israel not to respond, then accepted a limited attack to allow Iran to save face. Despite Israel's Friday morning attack, Iran focused on drones, not missiles, and avoided blaming Israel, reducing escalation risk.
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